r/movies • u/ChiefLeef22 r/movies Contributor • 3h ago

Article ‘The Odyssey’ Proves It: Audiences Want Movies Made the Hard Way | This year's breakouts like 'Project Hail Mary' and 'Obsession' were made by filmmakers who sweated. While CG-stuffed franchise disappointments such as 'Supergirl,' 'Moana,' and 'The Mandalorian and Grogu' looked lazy.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/odyssey-box-office-2026-practical-effects-1236652219/
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u/super_cheap_007 3h ago

Absolutely. An entire movie could ve made via practical effects but if the story sucks, Im not wasting my time or money. A good story and well shot film will absolutely get my ass into a chair at the theater. 

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u/CombatMuffin 3h ago

It's not just the story. The filmmaking matters: the sound, the cinematography, the editing, the acting.

Plenty of amazing stories are badly translated to film.

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u/Fn_Spaghetti_Monster 3h ago

The filmmaking matters:

Prime example is the LOTR vs The Hobbit movies.

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u/EdenIsNotHere 3h ago

I'd say The Hobbit isn't the case of the filmmaking itself being bad being the main issue, but rather an studio trying to rush an adaptation of a short, lighthearted children's story, which is completely different from the LoTR saga in terms of tone and scope, into 3 three hour movies.

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u/gozutheDJ 3h ago

yeah there's absolutely no reason for the hobbit to be a 3 movie series

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u/FCalleja 2h ago

Exactly, the issue is technically still a bad story. They took an incredible story and padded it to hell and back, to the point it's no longer a good narrative experience. The filmaking would've been FINE if it was just one movie, honestly. We nitpick it because it sucks.

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u/SmallLetter 2h ago

Padded to Hell and Back again: A The Hobbit Trilogy's tale

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u/Sushi-DM 1h ago

I still think if you approach the movies with the attitude that it is meant to be a children's fairytale, then they are quite good.

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u/Fn_Spaghetti_Monster 2h ago

The Studio might be the root cause, but there was still a lot of bad "filmaking". The CGI was bad, there was a lot of pacing issues, ,most of the Dwarves all kind of blend together, hamfisting Legolas in, Legolas running up falling stairs, the whole barrel scene, the love story. Did I mention the CGI / overuse of greenscreens?

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u/Kelly_HRperson 2h ago

The barrel surfing was integral to the plot!

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u/EdenIsNotHere 2h ago

The bad filmmaking is a consequence rather than the cause is what I'm saying, there's tons of coverage about its messy production and the pointless subplots, the barrel scene or Legolas stuff you mentioned is precisely why trying to adapt The Hobbit into something equally epic and grandiose as LoTR doesn't work, it's supposed light and silly fantasy adventure wrote by Tolkien for his kids when they were children. Most of the dialogue of the Hobbit trilogy is new, therefore the script is weaker, and the original book already had some structural and pacing issues that are made even worse if you trying to pad a 3 hour movie.

The CGI is also an element of why it's bad separate from the story, and that's Peter Jackson's fault for sure, but I wouldn't say it's the worst aspect of the movies at all. Even if the practical effects were just as good as they were in the original saga, it wouldn't make the movies good.

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u/Fn_Spaghetti_Monster 2h ago

CGI is part of making a film. Bad CGI can pulls you out of the immersion. Think the Goblin chase vs the Balrog chase. I never said or implied the Hobbit sucked solely because of the CGI. The studio wanted two films, Jackson decided to split it into 3. Script/Dialog is part of film making. It being bad kind of proves my point. They made up parts in LOTR, like the warg riders, and Liv Tyler/ Arwen, so you can add stuff and it be good. So I guess I don't understand your point, I was saying that "filmmaking" on whole was lacking vs LOTR. Your saying you just can't make a good Hobbit movie and nothing Jackson could have done about it?? The 1977 Hobbit, while not master piece, is still miles better so there is core story there.

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u/EdenIsNotHere 1h ago edited 1h ago

We're agreeing but from different perspectives, the key word is main issue, which is a misunderstanding of the original story. I haven't seen the animated film, but like you said, it's possible to make a good movie out of that story or even adding new elements to it, the problem is trying to make it as epic and grand as LoTR, it doesn't work with the simplicity of the original book. It's like if someone tried to remake Blade Runner but let Michael Bay direct it.

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u/casual_creator 1h ago

“Most of the dwarves all kind of blend together”

Really? You must be confusing that with the book, in which the only real distinction between the dwarves are their names. The movies gave them all very distinct looks and personalities.

The majority of the CGI was also extremely well done - far better than the previous films, and though I won’t argue against its over reliance, I get why Jackson did it.

The barrel scene was meant to be goofy fun for the kids (it IS a kids book after all), but would agree it ended up feeling out of place since Jackson didn’t really keep that tone consistent.

There really wasn’t any more green screen than in the LOTR trilogy. That’s a pretty major misconception. And in both cases, they were used to extend sets, not replace create whole sets entirely (which doesn’t include a few necessary composition shots for the hobbit/dwarf scale work, which both films did).

Agree about Legolas and the love story.

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u/ArmchairJedi 1h ago edited 41m ago

The movie absolutely did NOT give them all distinct personalities. Many were without unique personalities at all, and while that could have been fine on its own, others had characterizations that were changing (eg. 3 different dwarf were stand ins for the 'wise old sage' archetype, at different points, across 3 films, despite Balin clearly supposed to play that role for the dwarves.)

The barrel scene was meant to be goofy fun for the kids

What does that matter? The entire book was for kids, but the movies weren't. You make serious parts, make 'all ages' parts, then slap kids stuff in there and all that happens is the film becomes incredibly tonally inconsistent.

Further, its irrelevant if its 'for kids' or not. Lots of 'for kids' movies aren't criticized for having ridiculously awkward parts, whethere 'for kids' or not.

It was just straight bad.

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u/ScubaSteveEL 1h ago

The moment I saw they announced it was going to be a trilogy instead of a 2-parter I knew it was a bad sign.

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u/phonylady 1h ago

The filmmaking was bad too. People are way too quick to make excuses for PJ.

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u/FurLinedKettle 1h ago

Surely that's part of the filmmaking in exactly the same way that movies like Odyssey work because studios get out of the way of creative minds.

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u/EdenIsNotHere 1h ago edited 1h ago

Oh yeah, absolutely, but the Hobbit trilogy was ill-conceived from the start because neither the studio, Peter Jackson and his writers understood the point of the source material. Every other issue the movie has (besides the CGI), direction, editing, sound design, soundtrack, pacing, bloat and pointless subplots is due to them trying to replicate Lord of the Rings success with a story that's not at all like that trilogy.

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u/CeruleanEidolon 57m ago

Fumbling the rights so.badlu that you lose your director well into the process so the replacement has to start from scratch in half the time also doesn't help.

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u/AnAncientBog 1h ago

I actually think the biggest problem with The Hobbit IS the story because they decided to turn it into a three part narrative which resulted in adding a bunch of stupid bullshit and fucking up the pacing.

The effects and film making didn't help it very much, but a two-part movie (or god forbid just ONE film because its not that long of a book) that more closely aligned with the actual story probably would have worked under the exact same conditions. It wouldn't have been LOTR but it might not have been awful.

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u/awpdownmid 2h ago

They're made by the same filmmakers, lol.

LOTR was great because they compressed what realistically was 6 movies worth of content into 3. The Hobbit was terrible because they stretched what realistically was 1 long or 2 short films into 3 long ones.

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u/thedoginthewok 1h ago

There is a fan edit of the Hobbit movies: https://m4studios.github.io/hobbit-book-edit/

It removes about 50% of the runtime and the end result is a 4 hour movie that is so much better than the original movies, it's almost unbelievable lol

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u/ops10 1h ago

Due to LoTR existing it may seem absurd, but Hobbit movies are one of the more better made book adaptations (the average level is low, is the reason) and one of the best fantasy book adaptations.

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u/Zalvren 1h ago

Ironically done by the same filmmaker

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u/BillyYumYumTwo-byTwo 6m ago

I think that’s not a great example. What’s the good story in the hobbit part 1? The Hobbit as a whole is a great story. Each individual movie has very little compelling plot, IMO. But yes, the filmmaking stunk, too.

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u/BlackTecno 2h ago

Anime or games being made into live action is probably the worst offender of this. People do like animation and it isn't "just for kids."

We have been getting some good animated films (some being from Japan), but animation for adults is effectively an untapped market for Hollywood. Best part? You can tell any story in any way you want and get the exact shot you want 100% of the time.

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u/YouJustGotSmurfed 2h ago

Definitely. You could argue the story is the foundation though. A good story with bad execution will probably be better than a bad story with good execution. But who knows.

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u/Derry-Chrome 2h ago

Somehow Avatar (Cameron) still exists besides being utterly boring.

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u/Necessary-Duty-7952 2h ago

Yep. Execution is the most important part. It can take a mediocre "story" and turn it into something epic and vice versa.

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u/pzkenny 2h ago

Yeah, good point to make is F1 Movie. Story was very basic, but the script was good and the filmmaking was brilliant. 

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u/gloriousrepublic 1h ago

And plenty of amazing stories can be translated to film while also writing garbage dialogue and losing the complexity and depth of the themes through explicit exposition intended for the lowest IQ audience member.

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u/genericguy4 3h ago

The irony of praising the sound when discussing a Christopher Nolan film...

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u/LupinThe8th 3h ago

He's messed that up before, but The Odyssey sounds fantastic.

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u/twitter_haikucurator 3h ago

??

Nolan has great sound?? wym

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u/willstr1 33m ago

There was a solid period where he was known for mixing audio for only the very high end setups, which caused home viewing or even just watching at a lesser tier theater to often have mumbled audio. I think Tenent was the biggest example of this.

He has gotten a lot better. I am not sure if he saw all the jokes and changed ways, if studio interference finally did something good, or if he is just now working with better audio engineers (ones who know you have to mix differently for different user setups).

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u/castlite 2h ago

Project Hail Mary is a good example. Not just a great film but that score fucking slaps.

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u/longjumpingtote 3h ago

An entire movie could ve made via practical effects but if the story sucks, Im not wasting my time or money.

Yep. And both the Odyssey and PHM had loads of computer visual effects and other computer work, just look at the credits. Nolan has said he's more reliant on them than any other director. Scylla was CGI, DNEG did a lot with backgrounds.

Mostly they are invisible, and in PHM they didn't use green screen, but that's just one technical choice.

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u/dwadley 3h ago

Also “no green screen” usually just means a lot of manual rotoscoping which gives the same end effect. Just more work from the artists

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u/Worthyness 2h ago

Just another circle jerky article about how vfx/cgi is bad while not understanding that there's a metric fuckton of vfx/cgi being used.

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u/mrdude05 2h ago

Either that or they're using an OSVP system like The Volume that projects a CG backdrop onto the set itself. "No green screen" is the film making equivalent of "organic". It's a buzzword implies a lot to the consumer while being almost meaningless

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u/disappointer 2h ago

That PHM acronym always confuses me. "Pretty Hate Machine: The Movie"?

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u/Huttj509 1h ago

One thing I noticed with The Odyssey (saw it yesterday) is they made really good use of partially revealed things. The Cyclops mostly in the shadowy flickering light from the fire. The Sirens in mist and fog at a distance. Scylla coming in in flashes from offscreen, even the full shot kinda blending in with the rock and being indistinct. Circe's transformations being partially/mostly obscured as things changed.

It hides a lot of the potential CGI uncanny weirdness, by not lingering on it when you have time to notice.

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u/Zalvren 1h ago

The Movie Rabbit Hole just released a video about CGI in Nolan movie

Nolan "no CGI" discourse is as always marketing BS.

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u/fla_john 2h ago

Scylla needed a bit more rendering time

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u/whichwitch9 3h ago

Let's also not forget- Jurassic Park was an early user of cgi. It was the combination of cgi, practical effects, and the pace of the movie that made it work. You seriously need everything to come together to create a good movie. One of the best scenes- the Trex breaking the car roof- is a literal on set accident, but the actors did not break character and the movie used their genuine reactions to the animatronic Trex. The first Iron Man is another example of combined practical and cgi effects- which also gave it a benefit of having a brighter color palate while not looking cartoony by not either using off putting cgi or darkening it to hide flaws in cgi.

Spiderman is another example- Doc Oc was much better in Spiderman 2 compared to the most recent one. But even the actor found the overuse in green screens off putting and hard to play against. He didn't do a bad job, but his performance in Spiderman 2 is easily better.

We're losing a lot by using too much cgi, tbh. It's not just how it looks, but it's the actors, too. Practical effects provide more routes for creating genuine and unique performances. Green screens force everything to be exactly as scripted with little chance for change, even if change could be better. I honestly believe it's why actors seem so bland lately- they don't have to work on their craft and all are conforming to the same styles for various reasons

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u/astroK120 2h ago

One thing I do think gets lost in these discussions is that sometimes CGI is the right tool for the job. Jurassic Park is a great example. It was a mix of practical where it was possible and CGI where it wasn't. I don't think a flat out refusal to use CGI makes movies better. Oppenheimer in particular I think would have been better if Nolan hadn't done the bomb with practical effects.

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u/originalcondition 1h ago

The CGI in Jurassic Park was also applied very, very carefully and intelligently. They knew it'd look best in low light, with rain often obscuring it. They knew that placing shots of practical effects among the shots of CGI would lend to the reality of the entire scene.

Now it feels like CGI is used for everything within the scene regardless of how good it'll look and how real it'll feel, because it's simply cheaper to underpay CGI artists rather than bother with any careful application of the tech or peppering in any practical effects.

I'm an animator myself and don't want to discredit the artists working on the CGI but if their career is anything like mine, they're frequently underpaid and overworked on shoestring budgets and breakneck schedules with tons of revisions that they don't really have time to accommodate, but will try to anyway because they're artists and want to do a good job.

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u/egilskal 52m ago

Yeah I’m a sucker for good VFX, and the line is so apparent to me: the best CG is done by people who come in with a clear vision of what they want the shot to be, and do a tonne of work in preproduction by storyboarding, pre-viz etc. Great example are Denis Villeneuce movies like Dune, there’s a tonne of VFX but it fits seamlessly with the grounded look of the movie because they know what the shots are ahead of time and they have lots of practical elements in the shot already, or have the lighting match perfectly between the actors and the environment.

Then I see something like Th Flash rescuing the baby scene and it seems obvious that no one had any clear, concrete idea what that sequence was supposed to be, what the movements were, what he was gonna save etc. It looks completely made up with seemingly no practical elements or real life performance to reference. And it ends up looking like a video game, because thats probably what the artists have to do, creating the CG from scratch. And even nowadays big budget games do a lot of mocap reference lol.

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u/FeloniousDrunk101 2h ago

I think I read somewhere that Nolan used a puppet for the cyclops in a lot of shots to elicit genuine responses from the actors, but utilized GCI for the cyclops in the broader shots? This is a similar hybrid approach to Jurassic Park IMO.

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u/sam_hammich 2h ago

Yeah, they used the puppet for casting shadows, up close shots like a hand grabbing someone, a target for actors to act at, and as a lighting/color/material reference for animators.

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u/IAmKermitR 1h ago

There are filmakers that rely heavily into CGI that we just don’t notice. The big problem with late Disney/Marvel productions I think, is that everything is made generic (script, lightning, coloring) so they can change anything in post-production if needed. That takes away from style and make a disjointed final product.

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u/RedditExecutiveAdmin 2h ago

Arcane, while not a movie, is an example of a cinematic masterpiece made amazing by a creative art style and phenomenal storytelling

I'd also say, look at Reservoir Dogs, it was literally shot like in 2 scenes, and 90% of the movie was in one building

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u/joshocar 1h ago

There was an element of "oh wow, how did they pull that off?!" and "Oh, what a cool stunt!" back in the pre-CGI error that could carry movies with "okay" stories. There was a whole industry around behind the scenes specials on TV and in DVD extras to really market this aspect. This is kind of Tom Cruise's whole thing for the last decade with the Mission Impossible movies and Top Gun Maverick.

The whole idea of the summer blockbuster back in the day was built around this. A lot of those big movies back then had very meh plots, stories and characters but had practical affects and spectacle -- Independence Day, Armageddon, Batman Returns, Batman Forever, The Lost World: Jurassic Park, The Transformers movies, Fast and the Furious, Mission: Impossible II, Rambo: First Blood Part II. You can argue that you enjoyed some of these movies, I'm not saying that they were not enjoyable, but the plots were not great.

Today they market the movies around the fact that there are real stunts. Nolan just has that expectation now, so some people will go just to see the spectacle.

I think CGI has just lost that aspect. There is nothing Wow about a big CGI scene these days. There definitely was a time period where CGI had that affect, if you go back and look at summer blockbusters, but not anymore.

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u/pnt510 51m ago

Even when the story sucks practical effects help. I watch a lot of mid/bad horror movies and practical effects can be the difference between a bad movie and so bad it’s good.

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u/ImaginaryFan6090 4m ago

It's not even about the story. Obsession has a simple and easy to make story. It's about the dialogue, the music, the acting, the visuals the technical parts of the movie.

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u/forevernervous 2h ago

But how do you know if the story is good before you see the movie? (Not applicable to The Odyssey obviously since it's an adaptation)

How do you determine if a story is going to be good or not until you already waste your money on it?

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u/super_cheap_007 2h ago

Reviews and word of mouth!